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Monthly Archives: November 2016

This past week has been wonderful! I have been working on building and painting tiny homes for houseless folks to live in.

Over a dozen sleeping pods (shelters no more than 8′ x 12′) are being built through early December to prototype light, cheap, and quick to build shelter to support houseless communities.

The designs are inspired from an earlier community forum lead by houseless community leaders and villages with support from advocacy organizations, all within the network of the Village Coalition. The sleeping pods being built have been designed by architects, designers, and activists from around Portland and facilitated by the Partners On Dwelling (POD) initiative. I am working on the two tiny homes being built with City Repair and Communitecture which are both being build out of reclaimed materials, mostly old doors from the re-building center. These two sleeping pods show how we can house people for almost no money using our large waste stream for materials.

The build will finish early December for a display on the 9th,10th, and 11th, and afterward the sleeping pods will go to folks in need.

On this day last Thursday my mama and I met at the standing rock solidarity rally at Pioneer square. I love this place and feel inspired in knowing it used to be a parking lot until 1984 when it was transformed into the first public gathering place in downtown Portland. The creation of Pioneer square is revolutionary and we need more radical, beautiful places where we can come together and plan actions for the unfolding revolution.

Here is a poem I wrote thinking about all of this…

__________________________________________________________

Settler traditions and pies.

Remember, Remember Native peoples cries.

The cries that are still sounding today.

As militarized police use rubber bullets, water cannons and pepper spray.

On peaceful, unarmed water protectors.

Standing their ground to petroleum prospectors.

Defending the sacred for future generations.

United in prayer with hundreds of sovereign nations.

There people have been on this land for thousands of years.

Their history purposely forgotten due to government fears.

Of people remembering that this Earth is our home.

No matter how far we or our ancestors roam.

We all depend on clean water, air and soil.

We all know that the destroyer of these is oil.

So what is it going to take for us to stop feeding this bloated black snake?

How much longer until all of us are awake?

We are brainwashed to celebrate and believe in a false foundation

That this day is about family and a country built on good relation

Our country was built on slavery and genocide.

Our country was built on lies and maintaining a constant divide.

Separating, brutalizing and specializing our very mentalities.

Divide and conquer so we don’t see our human commonalities.

In reality this day is one of mourning

A day to buy nothing and send out a warning

To stop fattening the pockets of the corporate elite.

To focus on making sure everyone has enough to eat.

No thanks to the media blackout.

No thanks to the brainwashing in schools.

No thanks to the capitalist system.

No thanks to these unjust rules.

No giving into colonial isolation.

No giving into the corporate consumer fixation.

Building new pipeline infrastructure is the root of our collective devastation.

How do we stop this and end all land privatization?

How do we shift from a place of just trying to survive?

To recognizing beauty and gratitude for all that is alive?

The revolution is unfolding in front of our eyes.

Do we stop and listen to the stories of those who are wise?

Or do we keep chasing the illusive corporate prize?

Do we learn the history and become powerful allies?

Or do we run blind and meet our inevitable demise?

It is up to all of us to remember.

What is really being celebrated in late November.

Remember, Remember these government lies.

Remember, Remember its our time to RISE.

xoxo SB

Here is a picture of me at my preschool, Helen Gordon dt Portland. I think all of us are naturally born leaders and the system tries to beat our confidence out of us. Lets show them.

Thinking a lot lately of the Hindu monkey god Hanuman. Legend has it that Hanuman took a courageous leap, doing the splits over the ocean to rescue Sita, the beloved of Rama, to whom Hanuman was entirely devoted. (Also interpreted as uniting the physical with the metaphysical.) Hanuman took one look at the span across which he had to cross, thinking something along the lines of, “there’s no way I can do that!” Who hasn’t thought that same thing when faced with a monumental challenge??
Through love, devotion and selfless service he shows us we can grow through life’s seemingly insurmountable challenges. This pose (named after Lord Hanuman) is often called the “leap of grace”.

Yoga feels like a great analogy for creating a more beautiful future. In order to open my physical body I have to practice patience and persistence. In order to match our dream world with our physical reality we need to maintain constant pressure and commit ourselves to doing the work.

I often feel overwhelmed and unsure what actions to take to change our suppressive system of injustice and inequality…But I am fully dedicated to flowing in a path of service and doing whatever I can to make the world a more healthy and just place for everyone. I am privileged AF and want to use my time on this Earth to empower and lift those around me up.

“Everybody can be great…because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.”
― Martin Luther King Jr.

“You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”
― R. Buckminster Fuller

“What is power, after all? Every one of the power elite’s overwhelming advantages—military forces, surveillance systems, crowd control technology, control over the media, and nearly all the money in the world—depends on having people obeying orders and executing an assigned role. This obedience is a matter of shared ideologies, institutional culture, and the legitimacy of the systems in which we play roles. Legitimacy is a matter of collective perception, and we have the power to change people’s perceptions.”
― Charles Eisenstein, The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible